


The Beyond Words Collection

by dreamsweetmydear



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Compliant, Canon Het Relationship, Character Study, F/M, Gen, Magic Revealed, Post-Magic Reveal
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-25
Updated: 2014-10-23
Packaged: 2017-12-21 08:25:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 4,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/898100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dreamsweetmydear/pseuds/dreamsweetmydear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Drabbles in response to The Heart of Camelot's third series of prompts. Genres will range the gamut, and all drabbles are told in first person, just to flex my writing muscles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Devotion

**Author's Note:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Character: Hunith  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 398
> 
> A/N: Pre-Series

It’s difficult sometimes, being mother to a boy like mine.

My Merlin. He’s my very own miracle.

Sometimes I’m surprised that he’s turned out as good as he has. The life we’ve led…it could poison an innocent mind against the world, turn it dark and murky and disenchanted.

The other villagers were cruel to him during our hardest winters and sparsest harvests. They called him a curse, simply because he was born out of wedlock.

Never mind that my beloved Balinor and I were to be handfasted the week he was driven out by Uther’s men.

We were young and in love and impatient. Propriety wasn’t really our fashion anyway, considering I, a single young maiden, had allowed a single young man to live with me.

More than Balinor, though, Merlin is the very best thing that happened to me.

Unfortunately I had a hard time convincing my son of that. On one hand, he had the villagers treating him terribly, and on the other he had to watch as they turned their backs on me. He listened as the women called me a harlot and watched as the men leered and made unwanted advances to me.

But if I was going to teach my son strength and patience, then I had to embody those myself. So I fought back in my own way.

When the village men tried to kill my son because of a particularly bad harvest, I came at them with an axe, shot stones at them with a sling, and barricaded our home to keep them out. When the women spoke ill of me, I let them know that they weren’t so prim and proper themselves. And when anyone was in trouble or in need, I did my best to help anyway, often without thanks.

When the children refused to play with Merlin, I became his playmate and taught him to read and write. When his magic made him feel inferior, I asked him to give me a show with the embers of our fire, or help me bring something heavy down from an upper shelf.

And every night before he went to bed, I made sure to tell him that I loved him, and that he was worth every pain and hardship.

Merlin is the reason I fight for my self-respect.

He is my saving grace, and I am utterly devoted to him.


	2. Surrender

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Character: Freya  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 190

What no one knows is that whenever the curse takes me, I feel every part of the change.

And no matter what I do, it is a fight I always lose.

It starts with a sudden rush of magic sparking painfully up my spine, followed by another jolt that brings me to my hands and knees.

A scream rips from my mouth, the sound morphing halfway into something inhuman.

My hands and feet become paws, my spine stretches and pops and elongates, wings rip through my ragged clothes, and fur covers my body.

With a final screech, my face is lost to that of a feral beast.

But the absolute last part of me that is lost is my mind, forced to surrender to something darker that craves the taste of human flesh and blood.

My thoughts, my conscience, my humanity is lost in an abyss deep in the mind of the monster I’ve become.

I live a half-life because of this curse, and am worth nothing good because of it.

I am forced to kill forevermore, and I hate myself for it.

If only someone would kill me instead.


	3. Macabre

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Character: Morgana  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 247

I don’t bother with examining my appearance anymore, but every now and again, I come across my reflection.  
  
I can’t decide if I like what I see: chapped lips that are no longer the lush, rosy color they were but a few years ago; hair in a tangled mess of sable strands; my complexion more pale than it used to be.  
  
Perhaps the biggest change is my eyes. They are now hard, jade stones where before they were a softer green like grass.  
  
I always wear a variation of the same dark gown, its lace embellishments shredded, the laces of the bodice and the edges of the sleeves and neckline fraying.  
  
I look like a demon, with broken fingernails and protruding bones making claws of my hands. My body is thin and bony and sickly, and yet I can’t bring myself to care much. I still hold myself with confidence, and walk with the gait drilled into me by being a part of court.  
  
I’ve accepted this macabre caricature of the noblewoman I used to be. Magic has made me a monster, and Uther Pendragon’s prejudices and hatred and persecution have fueled my transformation.  
  
But just because I’ve accepted something, it doesn’t mean I have to like it.  
  
Maybe one day, when magic is free, and I am on my rightful throne, I will be able to see myself in the looking glass and not feel ambivalence.  
  
But right now, nothing is more important than my success.


	4. Delicate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Het (Canon)  
> Pairing: Merlin/Freya  
> Rating: K  
> Word count: 361  
> A/N: I wanted to be deep with this, but I think I really just needed to write something happy and fluffy. So here you go--a bit of happy, still-deeply-in-love Freylin.

“Blostma,” I murmur, and immediately I feel the warm tingle of magic taking shape in my hands.  
  
In my mind, I picture a rose—the petals red as rubies forming a large bloom, the stem and leaves a vibrant, healthy green. As the energy centers in my tightly cupped palms, I feel the tips of the leaves and the petals gently brushing my skin.  
  
Once the spell is complete, I open my hands to behold the bloom. Looking at it, I remember my beloved Freya, and how her hesitant expression morphed into one of surprised amusement the first time I performed this particular bit of magic.  
  
Of course, I had honestly intended to give her what she wanted—strawberries—but I was still learning, and mixed up my spells.  
  
If I could, I would go back to that moment, and do it all over again just the same, just to see her smile, and hear the laughter in her voice when she informed me, “That’s not a strawberry.”  
  
I press the rose to my lips, and close my eyes, recalling as much as possible about the only girl I’ve ever loved, before tossing the flower out on to the lapping waters of the Lake of Avalon.  
  
I watch as my rose, sent with a kiss, floats away from my little boat, and feel my heart lighten as a delicate hand that I recognize instantly as hers reaches above the surface of the lake to take the fragile blossom below the water.  
  
A particularly hard bob of the lake against my boat causes the water to spray gently into my face, clinging to my lips and eyelashes, and I can’t help but grin.  
  
Looking over the boat’s edge, I see an image of Freya flashing me a teasing grin, before bringing the rose I’ve sent her to her own lips. Soon after the image disappears, and while I feel a fleeting pang in my heart because these glimpses of her are never, ever enough, I can’t help but want to laugh as well.  
  
My darling has sent me a kiss back, after all.  
  
And still teasing me that my roses aren’t strawberries.


	5. Passionate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Character: Elyan  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 399  
> A/N: Elyan’s thoughts post-knighting in 3x13.

I wonder what my father would say if he saw me now.  
  
We got along all right when I was much, much younger, but our life was different then. My mother was still alive, working as a maid for Leon’s family. Gwen and I were typical siblings—laughing, fighting, looking after each other. I scared the baker’s boy away when he showed interest in my sister, because I didn’t like the idea of anyone taking a fancy to good, innocent Guinevere.  
  
And my father and I spent hours together in the shop, where he taught me the blacksmith’s art—the beauty of a perfectly forged sword—the blade gleaming like quicksilver, sharp enough to bite the skin with barest of touches.   
  
“The forge is the blacksmith’s heart,” my father would tell me, eyes reflecting the flames, voice passionate.   
  
And then my mother died, and I thought it was my fault. Never mind that my father, sister, and everyone else tried to convince me that it wasn’t because I was a child not trained for battle.  
  
I grew restless. It wasn’t enough just to make swords and armor anymore. It wasn’t enough just to run the forge.  
  
My fire died out the day my mother died. A forge without a fire isn’t a forge after all.   
  
Eventually, the strain between my father and I came to a head. “We are blacksmiths!” he roared. “This forge is our livelihood, our life!”  
  
“I don’t want to be a blacksmith anymore,” I yelled back at him. “What use is making weapons if you can’t use them?”  
  
“Peasants do not learn to do battle,” my father said. “That is not our place.”  
  
So I left, taking along the last sword I had forged. Every time I fought, i learned to better use the blade. I learned defensive maneuvers, to land blows, and parry attacks. The more I fought, the more I learned “doing battle” was sometimes murder with a nobler name.  
  
But then Gwen found me again in Fyrien Castle. Gwen, who had grown strong, proud, and beautiful like my mother. Gwen, who I left alone and unprotected, especially when our father was executed. Gwen, who fought enemies with her heart instead of a blade.  
  
Perhaps I wasn’t the sword-maker, but the sword itself.

Because of Gwen, I befriended Arthur, and today, he has knighted me.  
  
I have been forged anew because of them.


	6. Luminous

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Characters: Arthur  
> Rating: K  
> Words: 368

There are times—rare, once-in-a-blue-moon occasions—when I realize that I actually know very little about what makes Merlin tick.

The man spends everyday following me around, prattling on and on about the most mundane things. What the servants in the kitchens said that morning, how heavy my armor is, how he deserves a raise for all the times he’s supposedly saved my life—as if he’s actually saved my life, _honestly._

Generally, it’s easy to ignore his background chatter.

And then, we’ll be in a council meeting—because if I have to suffer through them, I see no reason why he shouldn’t suffer with me—and I’ll glance over at him and see a bit of Merlin I don’t usually see.

His posture might be slouched and relaxed, but his eyes are focused and alert, snapping from face to face as discussions progress, or wandering around the perimeter of the room, checking for danger like a soldier. Eventually, his gaze will catch mine, and he’ll make a stupid face because he thinks he’s being funny—he’s really not—and I’ll roll my eyes at him.

It’s his eyes, really. Luminous with an intelligence and wisdom that always seems to take me by surprise when I see it. The way he gives me advice on occasion, as though he truly understands the weight that I carry.

He doesn’t let me see that light all the time. More often, I’ll look into his eyes, and the cobalt irises will twinkle back at me in innocent, carefree merriment.

Sometimes I think they sparkle with a mysterious hint of gold.

But if I take the time to look into Merlin’s eyes when he isn’t looking at me, I can see it—the wisdom, the understanding, the light of knowledge beyond his years, as though he’s seen more than most soldiers.

Merlin carries a burden that he won’t let me share, but he’s always there to help me carry mine.

I just don’t understand him.

I’ve told him before not to pretend to be interesting.

I was joking with him of course, but…

There’s something about Merlin. Something I can’t put my finger on.

I wonder if I’ll ever puzzle him out.


	7. Imperious

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon AU)  
> Characters: Arthur, Merlin  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 399  
> A/N: This one is for my friend CaptainOzone, who requested I do “imperious” and BAMF!Merlin. Kind of a follow-up to "Luminous", and connected to the next two to deal with the fall-out of this one. This is set somewhere between S4 and S5.

I don’t understand what he thinks he can do, however. He doesn’t know how to fight.  
  
I want to smack him when he addresses the madly cackling sorcerer across the clearing.  
  
“You shouldn’t have done that.” The fury in his eyes oozes from his voice, soft and controlled, like the charge in the air just before a lightning strike. It feels like the air crackles around us.  
  
“What are you going to do, little servant? You’ve no way of defeating me! And now I shall be hailed the savior of magic-users everywhere for felling the great Arthur Pendragon!” the madman crows in imperious glee.  
  
“No,” Merlin says, shaking his head slowly, and the smile that curls his lips is deceptively soft. “What you did is make a mistake.”  
  
“And what sort of mistake have I made?” the man sneers at Merlin, and I watch in wonder as Merlin lifts his chin proudly. It strikes me that he looks oddly regal for someone who grew up in a farming village.  
  
“Have you ever heard the name Emrys?”  
  
The sorcerer snickers back at Merlin. “Emrys is a child’s fable, lauded by the druids as a god, supposed protector of the Pendragon line. Emrys isn’t real!”  
  
“See, that’s where all you people out to get this prat,” Merlin nonchalantly points his thumb at me, and I narrow my eyes at him in annoyance, “get it wrong. Because I hate to break it to you, but Emrys is very, very real.”  
  
“Really? Where is he now then, hmm? Where is the traitor?”  
  
When Merlin grins, it’s truly frightening. “Surprise.”  
  
And as I watch him battle our opponent with a flash of golden eyes, nary a spoken word, and a shaking fissure of the earth, my brain finally catches up to what I’m seeing and my world flips upside down.  
  
Merlin has magic—magic in spades—and is using it to protect me.  
  
I have been harboring a sorcerer for nearly a decade.  
  
My world narrows, darkens.  
  
Merlin has magic.  
  
My world goes black.


	8. Penetrate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon AU)  
> Characters: Arthur, Merlin  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 400  
> A/N: Follow up to "Imperious".

"You have magic,” I murmur hoarsely from my nest of blankets. Merlin sits near my head, his gaze concentrated on the crackling fire.  
  
“Yes, I do.” His eyes flash gold, and with a whispered word, the dragon of my house crest rises from the embers.  
  
“You lied to me. For years you lied to me,” I tell him, cursing myself for revealing how betrayed I feel.  
  
The animated dragon disappears into smoke, and Merlin finally meets my accusing stare, expressive eyes clear with relief. “I did.”  
  
His simple, honest answers surprise me. I expected more guilt, more fear, more pain.  
  
It makes me angrier. Why is he not as affected as I am? Why is he not hurting like I am?  
  
Does this mean I truly mean nothing to him?  
  
“How dare you be so cavalier? You have betrayed the trust of your sovereign Merlin! I should execute you on the spot according to the laws of Camelot, never mind—”  
  
“I’ve a story to tell you,” his soft voice, suddenly exhausted and pleading, penetrates my tirade. “So, for once, just shut up and listen. Please.”  
  
He launches into his story, defiant eyes daring me to silence him. He tells me of his childhood—being cursed and shunned for the circumstances of his birth, the heartache of watching his mother suffer because of him, all the while thinking himself a monster for all the trouble his unruly magic caused. He reminisces his arrival in Camelot, hoping for acceptance, only to watch a sorcerer die and realize he could die here as well. He tells me how he really saved me that first time with his magic, how he saved me every time after that in the last eight years.  
  
He confesses with moist eyes and a pained voice every loss he suffered and dark deed he committed in my name, in the name of Camelot. Why he poisoned Morgana, and released the dragon. His tragic love for the cursed druid girl Freya, and the truth behind his tears for Balinor. How he killed my uncle in the caves near Ealdor. How Will protected him with a lie. How he tried to kill me while under Morgana’s influence.  
  
As I listen, I suddenly understand his relief.  
  
Merlin is finally sharing his burden with me.  
  
He looks at me expectantly after he finishes his story.  
  
“So what shall my punishment be, Sire?”


	9. Fascinate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon AU)  
> Characters: Arthur, Merlin  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 397  
> A/N: Follow-up to "Penetrate," "Imperious," and "Luminous".

Merlin’s confession weighs heavy on my mind, and for the first time I realize I’m seeing Merlin as he truly is—a man just like me, willing to fight for the ones he loves the only way he knows how.  
  
But I don’t understand his loyalty to me. I’ve condemned magic time and time again.  
  
Merlin has so much power at his disposal, so honestly, why am I still alive?  
  
“You’ve protected me, often sacrificing your own happiness for mine.” I finally ask in confused fascination. “Why?”  
  
The smile he gives me is warm and fond, and lights his eyes with something I can’t name. “Because you’re a noble, altruistic, pure-hearted prat.”  
  
“I’m sorry?” Did he just insult me or give me a compliment?  
  
His smile softens, and his gaze is faraway. “When Ealdor was in trouble, you came to its rescue, even though it could have started a war.” His voice turns hushed, and his eyes have a glassy sheen. “You went on a dangerous quest against your father’s wishes to save the life of a lowly servant.”  
  
Merlin looks back at the snapping fire, shaping the embers again into fantastic creatures. “The druids call you the Once and Future King, the one who will unite all of Albion and return magic to the land. I’m supposedly destined to help you achieve that.”  
  
He shakes his head with a snort. “I don’t really know about all that. When I came to Camelot, I had no purpose. I wondered if I was a monster. I hated you and thought you were an ass, but then you’d do something stupid and noble. And I could see it then, you know? I could see how great you’d become, how loved you’d be by your people.”  
  
He smiles at me. “Protecting you saved me, in a way. Gave me a purpose. And you became my best friend because of it.”  
  
Merlin looks back at the flames.  
  
“I’d do anything for you. ‘Cause it’s true, y’know.”  
  
He grins at me, eyes bright.  
  
“I’m happy to be your servant, ‘til the day I die.”  
  
I realize then that I could never condemn him.  
  
Because he’s still…Merlin.  
  
I just understand him better now.  
  
Settling into my blankets more comfortably, I grin at him. “So do you only make fire animals or…?”  
  
Merlin’s joyous eyes glitter in the first rays of a new dawn.


	10. Forlorn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Characters: Gwen, Merlin  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 253  
> A/N: Post-5x13, matching my headcanon that Merlin went back to Camelot.

I stare out the window of our—my—chambers, watching the top of the west tower.  
  
I can see Merlin sitting forlornly on the turrets, leaning his weight against the stone wall. I know what he’s thinking about as he looks out over Camelot.  
  
Who he’s thinking about.  
  
I think of Arthur everyday. I see him in the flutter of the knights’ capes, hear him in the clink of chainmail and clash of swords on the training field.  
  
In the earliest moments of my mornings, I feel the phantom of his arms wrapped around me, the last vestiges of his scent wafting to my nose from his pillow.  
  
Even though he’s gone, Arthur is everywhere to me.  
  
And I can only imagine how much worse Merlin feels than I do.  
  
I lost my husband, the man I loved with all my heart, the man who loved me with everything he had.  
  
But Merlin?  
  
Merlin spent more years at Arthur’s side than I or the others did. He was with him for nearly every waking moment of every day for almost a decade. Everything Merlin ever did was for Arthur.  
  
Merlin was always my best friend. I know that the knights and I have often treated him like our little brother, and Gaius thinks of him as a son.  
  
Yet for Merlin, his best friend, his brother, his family, his very life was Arthur.  
  
The rest of us are slowly healing from the our loss, but I find myself wondering if Merlin ever will.


	11. Magnetic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Characters: Gwaine, Uther  
> Rating: K+ (light swearing because it’s Gwaine)  
> Word Count: 329

  
When you travel the lands the way I have, you hear a lot of talk about nobility and kings.  
  
And even I have to admit that Uther Pendragon wasn’t terrible as a king. The stories about Lot and Cenred and Caerleon—may he be damned to Hell—were much worse.  
  
I would never say Uther was the best king, of course. He was a pompous, overbearing arse most of the time, and he didn’t go out of his way for anyone, unless that anyone was of noble birth.  
  
I saved his son’s life, which I suppose would have gained me some favor in anyone’s eyes, it was easy to see that he generally hated me. I hated him right back. Principle, of course.  
  
I do wonder what the look on his face would have been like if I had told him I was the son of a knight?  
  
He’d probably look at me with scorn like all the other nobles I’d met in my travels.  
  
The git.  
  
But he had an odd sort of magnetic charisma about him. No doubt people were afraid of him, what with his penchant for blindly killing anyone with a hint of connection to magic. At the same time, though, of all the five kingdoms, everyone knew Camelot’s people were generally the most protected and looked after.  
  
No one could deny that Uther Pendragon cared about his people’s well being. He may have eradicated magic from the lands, or tried anyway, but he also kept his taxes reasonable, made sure to assign employment for vassals who came to him in need of work, and worked hard to keep his people protected. He understood the value of his subjects, even if he didn’t condone socializing between classes.  
  
I’ll never say Uther was a good king.  
  
But he wasn’t bad.  
  
I’m just thankful that Arthur got all the man’s best qualities. Makes following his orders—or not following as the case may be—much more bearable.


	12. Haunting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Characters: Gwen, Tom  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 192

I shiver as I step foot into what is now my house.  
  
The room is dim, light faintly coming through the curtains over the window, and it seems the shadows shift around me and reside in every corner. The air smells musty and old and so very empty, but what sticks out to me are the small things scattered around that used to belong to my father.  
  
A tunic in the process of being mended. A pair of spare boots. His bed peeking through the curtains to the back room, his blanket hanging off the end.  
  
My breath shudders in my chest, and I fight the urge to break down into tears again.  
  
It feels as though my father is still haunting what used to be our home.  
  
Not ready to face living here alone with the ghost of his memory, I step back outside, close the door, and return to the castle in the hopes that my Lady Morgana will pardon my weakness and allow me to stay in her antechamber for awhile.  
  
Just until it feels like his ghost is gone.  
  
Just until my father’s passing doesn’t hurt so much.


	13. Remorse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Category: Gen (Canon)  
> Characters: Uther, Arthur  
> Rating: K  
> Word Count: 340  
> A/N: Pre-series featuring little!Arthur. Just so you know, this one is one of my favorites... :D

“Arthur?”  
  
A small blond head peeks out at me from around the bed, face ruddy with crying and bright blue eyes puffy and red.  
  
“H-Hello Father,” he murmurs at me, and I keep my expression neutral as I approach him.  
  
He comes out fully from behind the bed and stands straight and tall, though he barely comes up to my knee and so seems very small from my height. I can see how hard he tries to keep his face composed, though I can see more tears gathering in his eyes.  
  
His small hands are stained in ink, and there is a large blotch of ink on his white tunic. Somehow, my son has managed to streak some ink on his nose and cheek, and has even gotten some in his hair.  
  
I raise my eyebrow slightly at him. “Arthur, why are you covered in ink?”  
  
He mumbles an answer, but I can’t understand what he says. “Speak clearly, Arthur. Why are you covered in ink?”  
  
“I d-dwopped i-it.”  
  
I nod. “And why were you touching my inkwell?”  
  
Arthur remains silent for a moment, not looking at me. The moment stretches on, and I can feel myself starting to grow impatient. “Arthur, I’m waiting.”  
  
“I-I was t-twyna h-help you.” His face crumples into an expression of remorse, and he begins crying again in earnest. “I w-wan’ed to play wif you, b-but Rosy says yer too b-busy. S-so I twy to h-help wif yer papers, s-so you c-could play wif me. B-but I dwopped the ink and—and—“  
  
As his cries devolve into large, gasping sobs, my composure cracks and I gather my son in my arms, holding him tight and pressing a kiss to his fair hair.  
  
Arthur’s nursemaid is right, of course. I am always too busy. I have a kingdom to run, subjects to look after, and policies and other important decisions to make.  
  
But as I comfort my son, I vow to myself to never again be too busy to spend some time with him.


End file.
